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Towards a Model of

Interdisciplinary Teamwork:

What can Social Theory

Contribute

Peter Kraker

Sebastian Dennerlein

WSWT Workshop

Websci‘13

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My Background

Web Science

and Information Science

, TEAM, and CODE

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Introduction

Each scientific disciplines has its own culture Kuhn:

“paradigm“

At times, new problems arise that cannot be answered

with the standard paradigm of a single discipline:

Interdisciplinary fields such as Web Science emerge

In Web Science, social scientists need to work with

computer scientists

Researchers often do not build on each other’s strengths

but they are rather suspiciously looking at each other’s

results.

• Social scientists tend to disregard computer scientists‘

results because they are not grounded in theory.

• Computer scientists tend to disregard social scientists‘

results because they are not based on big datasets.

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Computer Science Approach to Research

Fayyad et al. (1996)

This is when computer scientists turn to social scientists!

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Social Science Approach to Research

Dodigovic (1998)

This is when social scientists

turn to computer scientists!

model

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The Models vs. Patterns Problem

Computer scientists cannot test social scientists’ models

because they often do not have the data in the form that is

required by these models

Social scientists on the other hand have a hard time interpreting

computer scientists’ patterns because they are too specific to

be covered by traditional theories and models

This is what we call the patterns vs. models problem

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Interdisciplinary Teamwork and Social Theory

Web Science should close the gap that results from the

patterns vs. models problem:

• On the more pattern-oriented side, it would be important to

understand that theories are more than just castles in the sky

• On the more theory-oriented side, researchers need to

understand that data mining methods can be useful to evaluate

models, but their properties need already be considered when

building the models

But:

Such an understanding cannot be reached, when work is simply

divided between parties and then brought together in the end.

In our view, Web Science requires “interdisciplinary

teamwork” among the disciplines involved.

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Interdisciplinary Teamwork and Social Theory

In the following, we present two theoretical strains which we

see as relevant to achieving interdisciplinary teamwork and

overcoming the patterns vs. models problem:

• Dillenbourg’s and Roschelle & Teasley’s understanding

of

Collaboration vs. cooperation

• Bronstein’s

“Model for Interdisciplinary Collaboration”

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Cooperation vs. Collaboration

Cooperation Collaboration

Interdisciplinary teamwork in Web Science requires

not only cooperative but also collaborative efforts.

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Bronstein’s Model of Interdisciplinary

Collaboration

Problem:

Interplay between collaboration and cooperation is not modeled

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Model Sketch

Interdependence:

collaborate to establish a shared meaning

cooperate to make use of the competencies of each

discipline

assembling the partial achievements, making sense of them

and planning how to further progress

Newly created professional activities: collaborative

paradigms

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Model Sketch

Understanding of collaboration and cooperation as phases of the overall construct of “interdisciplinary teamwork”.

These phases are alternating with respect to Bronstein’s components and the progress of achieving the common goal.

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Outlook

• Draft a formal model

• Understand other influences on interdisciplinary

teamwork such as:

• power (Foucault) and

• authority (Bourdieu)

• Evaluate the model in an interdisciplinary way!

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Funded by

Thank you for your

attention!

pkraker@know-center.at

sdennerlein@know-center.at

http://science20.wordpress.com

http://twitter.com/PeterKraker

http://twitter.com/SDennerlein

WSWT Workshop

Websci‘13